The past few days have been humbling. I spiked a fever of 103 on Friday and was admitted to the hospital for 3 nights. I had just arrived upstate with my mom and son, where I was meeting my husband and planning to have an idyllic Autumn weekend picking apples and relaxing with friends.

But on the drive up I could tell that I was starting to get a fever. By the time I arrived three hours later it was 102 and I knew that this was an emergency.

Four years ago this month, I was diagnosed with Chronic Kidney Disease (CKD). At the time, I had never even heard of Kidney Disease. Nothing could have prepared me for that moment. That was the moment I was told I could not carry a child. That was the moment my dreams were taken away from me. I was scared and devastated and I had no idea how this diagnosis was going to change my life.

I have always been somewhat superstitious. For as many times as I have knocked over a salt shaker, I have tossed salt over my shoulder. "I don't want to jinx myself" is pretty much standard vocabulary. I'm one to say things like "knock on wood," when I am speaking about something that is going well or "God forbid," if I am talking about a potentially negative situation occurring. "Ptoo ptoo ptoo...spit on me," if you are saying something favorable, to keep the evil away, is probably my all time favorite and very common in the Greek family I grew up in.

Jeff and I had been trying to conceive for almost 1 year, so when we found out that we were expecting, we were thrilled, but remained cautiously optimistic. Although we told two friends that had also been trying to get pregnant, we decided not to share our news with anyone else until we had confirmation that things were progressing well with the pregnancy.

Last week I revealed that Jeff and I were off to meet our new surrogate, Britany, in person for the first time. It was a very successful visit and we all got the medical and psychological approvals we were hoping for in order to move forward!

After sharing this news so many people asked me if our “pea” was now in Britany’s “pod.” It struck me that I have never shared exactly how long of a process the surrogacy journey can be and how things are extra complicated because we live in New York.